Roman gladiator’s skeleton bears signs of combat against surprising opponent

An 1800-year old human skeleton unearthed from a Roman cemetery has revealed bite marks consistent with a large cat, like a lion, and is being called the first hard evidence of human-animal combat in England during the Roman Empire.

Archaeologists say the man may have died as part of a gladiator show or execution, and that the felid may have gnawed on his pelvis at around the time of his death.

Since the individual was also decapitated, the archaeologists suggest this may have been done “to put him out of his misery at the point of death.”

His skeleton was likely buried sometime between 200-300 CE near the Roman city of Eboracum, now York in England. It is the first direct, physical evidence of human-animal combat from Europe during the Roman Empire.

“As tangible witnesses to spectacles in Britain’s Roman amphitheatres, the bitemarks help us appreciate these spaces as settings for brutal demonstrations of power,” says Dr John Pearce of King’s College London, co-author of a study detailing the findings in the journal PLOS ONE.

The spectacle of gladiator combat captures modern day imaginations, especially through epic historical dramas such as Ridley Scott’s Gladiator (2000) which depicts gruesome battles against both man and beast.

Despite a wealth of gladiator combat evidence surviving through mosaics, sculptures and inscriptions, however, actual gladiator remains are relatively scarce in the archaeological record.

“The nature and scale of person/animal combat in Roman Britain is contested,” the authors write in their study.

“While images survive of such confrontations, there has been no published evidence to date which provides direct testimony of such events taking place in the province. The same is true of much of non-Mediterranean Europe in the Roman period, which lends a wider context to the results of this study.”

Eboracum was founded as a fortress by the 9th Legion of the Imperial Roman army. The 6th legion remained garrisoned there until the end of the Roman period in the early 5th century. In 2004, archaeologists dug up a Roman-era burial site at Driffield Terrace, about 1km southwest of York city centre.

The site contained the remains of mostly young and middle-aged men, often with evidence of trauma, which has led to speculation that it could be a gladiator burial site.

David Jennings, CEO of York Archaeology, adds: “One of the wonderful things about archaeology is that we continue to make discoveries even years after a dig has concluded, as research methods and technology enable us to explore the past in more detail.”

The remains of one man, aged 26-35 years at his death, had a series of depressions on both sides of the pelvis which was suggested could be evidence of carnivore bites.

For the new analysis, the researchers created a 3D scan of the marks and compared the shape and positioning of the injuries to bites from a variety of animals. They found the bite marks are consistent with documented cases of large cat bites.

However, the location on the pelvis suggests that they were not necessarily inflicted as part of an attack, since felids tend to cause trauma to the neck, shoulders, arms, chest and head.

Rather, they propose that the injuries were the result of scavenging at around the time of death.

“This latest research gives us a remarkable insight into the life – and death – of this particular individual, and adds to both previous and ongoing genome research into the origins of some of the men buried in this particular Roman cemetery,” says Jennings.

“We may never know what brought this man to the arena where we believe he may have been fighting for the entertainment of others, but it is remarkable that the first osteo-archaeological evidence for this kind of gladiatorial combat has been found so far from the Colosseum of Rome.”